


Only For One's Eyes

by skekMal



Series: Against All Odds [4]
Category: The Dark Crystal (1982), The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (TV)
Genre: Fluff and Sweetness, M/M, the wholesome relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:00:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24094720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skekMal/pseuds/skekMal
Summary: A trade I did for ryanglitter - his favorite Dark Crystal ship, skekEkt with skekAyuk.They both know each other so well... so they don't even need words to understand.
Relationships: skekAyuk/skekEkt (Dark Crystal)
Series: Against All Odds [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1701280
Comments: 8
Kudos: 12





	1. Evening Melancholia

**Author's Note:**

> It's my first time writing Ekt and Ayuk so hopefully, it is worthy :) I enjoyed it thoroughly, though!

The dusk was rich in colors, the dying sun reaching the point which skekEkt loved the most. The warm dim light was bathing him in the crimson aura, making him look like a statue, on the balcony, which purposefully was settled just as right as to give him - or any other visitor - the best display of Thra before him.

skekEkt closed his eyes and his gloved hands reached his face, feeling as the last rays touch his cheek in a soft caress.

He was _young_ , he was vivid and he was colorful and everything in between and beyond.

This was so unwise. To think that way. To even bother himself with any longing, any sadness, even in face of melancholia of the moment.

He laughed to himself, his bright eyes opening, his lush nightgown not hiding the feathers, which always were his pride. He groomed them today even more carefully than the other times. He felt that this day may be special, in some ways. But it passed, slowly, and he watched as skekSo leaves with skekMal, and skekZok with SkekTek and he felt that this day will be a loss unless something happens. Something that makes his quills fluff on his back and around his well-maintained neck.

The balcony was set above the feasting chamber and there was a perfect view from it. The sight always was knocking the breath from his lungs and he could spend hours here, only looking at the bright promise of the forest in the distance, cut with luminescent paths, the river that could be seen even from here, as it ran meandering through the green land.

Why this must be so good? And why he feels sad when he looks longer on this scrap of a ground? When the night catches him on observing how the flora and fauna of darkness brim so close to the castle, almost a tide of life.

"Thinking about things, eh?" he heard a voice that he could not mistake for anything else.

"I just... eh, too much wine" skekEkt turned gracefully to the other skeksis. It didn't run his attention that his movement pushed a slight sight from skekAyuk lungs. skekEkt giggled at that.

"You are an exceptional creature, skekEkt" mused the Gourmand. taking a place next to him, his fattened hands landing on the edge of the balcony. His eyes looked clever when he cocked his head and looked up at the skeksis standing by his side. "That's why you left so early, hehe... to bath in the sisters' lights?"

"Ah..." skekEkt wanted to say something really sharp, but all thoughts were cleared off his mind, letting him relax and flatten in the presence that was calming his longing. His beak pointed up, as he murmured.

"I am _fulfilled_ now."

"Hmm?"

"You know what I mean" skekEkt's palm swatted the Gourmand's hand and skekAyuk laughed lightly, in his usual deep tone.

"I never knew you are that sentimental."

"I am not."

"You are, skekEkt. And I like you - above many things - because you are."

"Only _like_ , hmm?"

"You know what I meant" skekAyuk retorted playfully, the remark making his partner burst into soft laughter.

The skeksis leaned against each other, rather out of sheer instinct to do so, than purposefully. They always were gravitating to each other, since they were born in shrieking and fear, finding in each other solace against the pain of the first moments on Thra. They never laid with any other, they never even thought of it. For them, it was only the other one, calming, beautifully matching, perfect like a glove made to fit the hand.

They didn't even need any words, to understand each other. They... just were. Together.

"You liked the meal" stated skekAyuk, grinning. "I have seen how elated you were by the taste. It definitely _pleases_ me."

skekEkt again closed his eyes and again smiled. Probably the only skeksis that always put a remark on his table mannerisms and who liked them, above all.

The loud groaning pierced the air. skekEkt moved his head in more than understanding manner.

"I think one of our friends is close to the pinnacle of this evening."

"Yes. Hehe. That was... yes, skekOk. I will recognize this pitchy voice everywhere."

" _Pitchy_ voice."

"Especially during certain activities."

"He screeches like a rutted fizzgig!"

They laughed, way too eagerly, way too loud. Not at all thinking about sharing a similar moment together, now. Not at all feeling warming hunger and desire, that slowly started to creep into their bones. Not at all seeing this desire in each other's eyes, in each other's gestures.

"I want---"

"I need---"

Yes.

...

_Oh yes._


	2. Bad Cook

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> skekAyuk invents new meals and skekEkt eagerly tags along.

"Hmm, the scent is delicious..."

skekAyuk couldn't stop a grin coming and lightening his features. The Ornamentalist was leaning just against his arm, with his maw touching his shoulder, catching the thick air from the pot in which he poured newly crafted spices. skekEkt even bent in the finesy so particular to him, appreciating the meal he was making. For the Gourmand, food was another form of fine art. It was again a tiny but very important stone added to his respect for his partner.

"The addition of troph root definitely improved scent... and not only, heh."

skekEkt eagerly moved with his tail, swatting the Gourmand just in the leg, strong. skekAyuk didn't give even a small sign, that he felt that.

"Will you... allow..."

The Ornamentalist took a fancy finger fork, which he used even outside the feasting room and daintily pierced the meat that cooked in the pot, tearing a small slice and putting slowly into his beak.

There was a silence and then, skekEkt's face radiated with a light that was unable to not be recognized. It tasted good.

" _Oh_!"

skekAyuk couldn't not laugh at his expression.

"skekMal found some new animal in those dark woods. The meat is delicious, but with the addition of troph root, it's exquisite."

skekEkt reached for another small portion but the Gourmand stopped his hand, rather playfully.

"No, no... you wait for the feast, the surprise - and hunger - will be bigger."

He received a huff at that. Well, he would probably give him more, if he asked one more time, but he didn't.

Instead, skekEkt reached for the smaller pot and looked there. The lace and silk robes almost got stained in the sauce, which skekEkt, strangely for him, ignored.

"This... this is..."

"A goden soup. A new thing, as well. Made from seaweeds that you can find near Sifan Coast."

skekEkt looked at him suspiciously.

"Has skekMal also brought you _these_? I can't imagine him diving in the ocean..."

"Of course not. These were a gift from the Sifa. Apparently skekSa made even more friends there."

skekSa was a common topic among the skeksis. She was so different from any other and tales said that even almost worshipped by her gelfling crew, that the court of chattering birds, as skekOk was calling them, was living with news on her. The same with the Hunter, it seemed that all of them gravitated to the unknown and different and interesting and special.

It was not a new fact, that for skekEkt, the only special one was skekAyuk, as familiar as he was for the others.

"Water, I accept, only in the bath" the Ornamentalist joked, embracing the shorter form of skekAyuk with his gloved hands. The master of the kitchen tensed so fast that he couldn't help but huff.

"Something wrong?"

"Eh..."

"Hmm?"

"... I just thought about a bath with you. _Alone_."

skekEkt eyes widened but definitely not from the surprise. Bathing was always a perfect excuse and not only an excuse for the good time spent.

"... but first, I do the meal."

skekEkt's beak would form an "o", if it was capable to do it. His hand pushed the Gourmand, almost hard.

"Bad _bad_ cook. You will let me starve and do dinner for the others?"

"Definitely. As long as this task will get me a reward in the form of your pleased and elated face during the feast."

"Naughty cook..."

"Yes. Of course."

skekEkt bent a bit and placing a very warm and very affectionate lick on the tip of his lover's beak, he put a hand on his chest. and whispered.

"Don't let me down, _naughty_ cook."

skekAyuk chuckled heartily.

"Let you down? Never."

skekAyuk, allowing the Ornamentalist to return to his designing duties - ad he heard that he does a new set of embroidered pillows for the imperial chambers - inhaled the scent coming from the boiling pot.

Oh yes. It's indeed delicious. And he still had few surprises in his sleeve.

But only for one's eyes.


	3. We Know Better To Never Cry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ekt and Ayuk never belonged to each other more than now. Even if they deny it.

"Would you go back? If you could?"

"Of course."

"To the days when you didn't have me?"

"To the days when I had you even more."

skekEkt always had a reply, a lush one, well thought up, beautiful like himself. Sometimes prissy, to tease the interlocutor. But he was wise, in this special carefree way, that others could only see or not. Admire or loathe.

But now, his beak was tightly shut, to not let it slip something silly.

Had him even more? But they were living like a couple of married gelfling now! Everyone knew and everyone has seen them at least hundred of times like they preen their back feathers with care unusual for anyone inhabiting the castle. Even the other well-known secret couples knew they are not secret anymore. And that felt good.

The youngest days passed like a space rock with waving tail, marking the Thra with joy, marking his life with happiness, and now, when he was five hundred thirty two trines old, making him nostalgic. The court was much more organized now, stale, rougher and Emperor laughed less, was more capricious. It was obvious that because skekMal left the castle. Not like always, for a few days, or few Unum. He left for five trines and didn't come back yet. They didn't dare ask skekSo how he feels about it, not anymore. It was obvious he would act cruelly like he started when he left.

"Have me more. Gourmand, you beautiful thing, you have me just as then! I would say that more now."

skekAyuk didn't look mischievous now. It was a certain sadness to it. Full of admiration, but still sad.

And then it dawned on skekEkt.

skekAyuk also longed. For the laziness of gathering naps, the sight of couples running to various places to indulge. For the lack of thick robes, which now became the obvious things to start covering the signs of age.

For the first time, they tasted meat and partied for days. For the gleam in his own eyes when they danced on the balcony, stark naked, glorious, feathered brightly, no quill stained with grey sand from the life hourglass.

His gloved hands reached the plump cheeks of his lover.

"You have me."

"Ekt..."

"You have me. Even if Thra collapses."

"When we collapse..."

"I don't care."

skekAyuk didn't smile, did nothing of things he usually was doing when the atmosphere started to be sad or brooding. He just nodded. His pupils yet were full of sparks.

They knew each other too well, to let it go and made any unnecessary remark or comment.

"I should make you a robe that reflects your eyes, Gourmand." skekEkt just said.

"You did. Many times."

"Yes. But now I see something new in them."

Something new. Something old. Something familiar. This was color he could paint the castle with if he was allowed.

"...but one robe will do."


End file.
